Читать книгу Freddy and the Baseball Team from Mars - Walter Rollin Brooks - Страница 4

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The winter headquarters of Boomschmidt’s Stupendous & Unexcelled Circus was usually in Virginia, but this year, partly because the animals had so many friends in Centerboro, and partly because they had never had a chance to try any winter sports, they had voted to spend the winter in the North. Centerboro was of course only a few miles from the Bean farm, and the circus was encamped in the baseball park just outside the town. Mr. Boomschmidt and his wife, who was Mademoiselle Rose, the bareback rider, and his mother, who spent all her time knitting him fancy waistcoats that didn’t fit, lived in a little house with a big picture window at the edge of the ball park. Here they could sit and look out through the window at the wagons where the animals lived, all drawn up in a circle; and they could watch the various performers practicing their acts, in preparation for the coming season.

All the performers in the big tent were animals except Mlle Rose and Mr. Hercules, Mr. Boomschmidt’s brother, a huge man who looked just like Mr. Boomschmidt blown up to three times life size. Mr. Hercules did weight lifting and some juggling. He wasn’t very bright. Old Mrs. Boomschmidt said she guessed all his brains had gone to muscles. “Takes after his father,” she said. “He could lift a five-hundred-pound sack of gold coins with one hand, but he wouldn’t have known what to do with it if he had.”

It took the flying saucer only a few seconds to cover the four or five miles between the farm and Centerboro. Freddy had Two-clicks bring it around up to the back door, where it hovered for a minute so that he could step from it right into the house, without having anybody but the Boomschmidts know that he’d come. Mr. Boomschmidt was delighted to see him, and kept patting him on the back and saying: “My goodness, it’s good to see you, Freddy! My goodness gracious me, now we’ll have Squeak-squeak back home in two shakes!” And Mlle Rose and old Mrs. Boomschmidt rushed out into the kitchen, from which came a rattle of crockery and a crashing of pots and pans, and pretty soon they came back with an enormous chocolate cake smothered in whipped cream, and a big pot of cocoa.

Mrs. Boomschmidt helped Freddy to cake. “We’re very happy to have you here, Freddy,” she said. “Very happy.” And Freddy noticed that tears were running down her cheeks as she smiled at him.

“Now, now, Mother!” said Mr. Boomschmidt, and to Freddy he said: “Mother always cries when she’s happy.”

“My goodness,” said Freddy, “but that doesn’t leave you anything to do when you’re unhappy, ma’am.”

“Oh, I cry then, too,” said Mrs. Boomschmidt, wiping her eyes.

Freddy shook his head. “But—but how does anybody know....” he began.

“They don’t,” said Mr. Boomschmidt.

Freddy gave it up. “Well, I’m glad you’re happy today anyway, ma’am. And now, how about Squeak-squeak?”

There wasn’t much to tell. At first, to keep them from being mobbed whenever they appeared in public, the Martians hadn’t been allowed to go into town by themselves. But after the people had got used to them, they were free, like all the circus animals, to go where they pleased. In Centerboro, as in other communities where they were well known, the animals entered into the town’s social life. They were invited everywhere; several of them had joined the Centerboro Country Club; Andrew, the hippopotamus, was a member of Rotary; and Leo, the lion, and two of the elephants had even taken up golf. It was not at all unusual to glance in a lighted window in the evening and see a tiger dining with the family, or Willy, the boa constrictor, taking a hand at the bridge table. And so the Martians, since they had nice manners, and in addition were curiosities from another planet, were made much of. Now that they could understand, and even speak a little English, they hardly dined at home one evening a week.

Three days ago Squeak-squeak had had dinner at the home of a Mr. Henry Avalanche. After a pleasant evening of tiddlywinks, the guest had started home. At nine thirty he had stopped at a store two blocks from the ball park and bought a bag of freshly roasted peanuts, of which all the Martians were very fond. But he had never reached home. Somewhere between the peanut store and the ball park he had disappeared.

“Was there no trail of peanut shells leading from the store in any direction?” Freddy asked.

“That’s what we looked for,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “Because you can trail the Martians all over town that way. They’re always eating peanuts and throwing the shucks away. There wasn’t a trace.”

“What makes you think he was kidnapped?” Freddy asked.

“My goodness, he wouldn’t have left town without telling the other Martians. And if he’d had an accident, we’d have heard.”

“What can you do, Freddy?” Mlle Rose asked eagerly.

“I’ll have to think about it a little before I answer that question,” Freddy said, putting on his Great Detective expression, which made him look almost cross-eyed with determination. Indeed he hadn’t the faintest idea what to do. But that was almost always so at the beginning of a case. The great thing was not to let his client know how hopeless he felt. He knew that if his cases were finally solved, it was more by luck than by brilliance. But he’d always been lucky. He would stall along, and sooner or later would come the lucky break.

He sat eating his third piece of cake and looking out the window at the circus encampment. An elephant went by carrying a pail of water. He kicked up the snow with his big feet. “I bet that tail of his is cold,” Freddy thought. “I bet he’d like a tail-muff like mine.” Mr. Hercules came out of his trailer and began taking his afternoon exercise, juggling ten-pound cannonballs. Two alligators stopped to watch him, then one said something in the other’s ear, and they both began to giggle and walked on. On the other side of the row of wagons four of the Martians were playing catch. They never seemed to mind the cold, and never wore gloves or overcoats. Leaning on the fence and watching them were a dozen or so boys and men. One of them, a tall, burly man with a red face, looked familiar to Freddy. He stared at him for a minute, but couldn’t place him, and then Mr. Boomschmidt said:

“You know, when we get Squeak-squeak back, I’d like to find something for the Martians to do in the big tent. I don’t think they’re contented being just a side show and sitting around having people stare at them. They want to get into the act. Maybe you could think of something, Freddy.”

One of the Martians had just reached up and caught a high fast ball. He caught it with three hands, but used only one to send it whizzing on to the player on his left.

“Looks like a regular baseball they’re playing with,” Freddy said. “Do they play like this often?”

“Herc got ’em interested in it,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “He used to play professional ball, you know. Pitched one season for Pittsburgh. But he was too strong. No catcher could hold his fast ball. And my gracious, when he hit one he knocked the cover right off. I guess he got kind of disgusted; he said it was a sissy game, and quit. He said if they’d play it with cannonballs and iron bats it might be worth playing.”

Freddy had been watching the Martians. “You know,” he said, “they’re pretty good. They’re fast, and they’re accurate. Say, why couldn’t you organize them into a baseball team? Get games with the local ball clubs in the towns where you give shows. Look—watch that one throw—I think it’s Chirp-squeak. He threw with his upper left arm last time, now he’s using his lower right one. Boy, what a pitcher you could make out of him! Yeah, and now he’s using his lower left. Can you see how balled up a batter would get if he didn’t know which of four arms a pitcher was going to use?”

“Golly!” said Mr. Boomschmidt. “I think you’ve got something, Freddy. Yes sir, I do! Only—hey! Wait a minute! How do we know they can hit?”

“I don’t care whether they can or not,” Freddy said.

“Well but, Freddy—we got to get hits to win games.”

“We’ve got to get runs,” said the pig.

“Why, sure we have, but—”

“Look,” said Freddy, “you help me to organize this team and I’ll guarantee you the runs. Now we’ve got five Martians. Four if Squeak-squeak doesn’t get back. Who else have you got to fill out your team?”

“Well,” said Mr. Boomschmidt modestly, “of course there’s me—”

Old Mrs. Boomschmidt said: “Orestes used to be a real good player. If there was a whole pane of glass in the neighborhood, even if it was two houses down and around the corner, he could put the ball right through the middle of it.”

“Now, Mother,” said Mr. Boomschmidt. ‘Let’s let bygones be bygones, specially when they’re thirty-year-old ones. Well, now, I think we can scrape up enough talent to fill out a team. There’s me, and there’s the ostrich, Oscar. Ever see him throw a stone? He throws underhand, like he was bowling—or maybe it’s underfoot, because he throws with a claw. He can catch, too, though not the high ones. He’d be good at shortstop.

“Then there’s Leo. He played softball one winter down in Florida. So did the two elephants. Old Hannibal, he never used a bat—used to swing at ’em with his trunk. He could throw with that trunk, too. Oh, my gracious, Freddy, I believe we could get up an Interplanetary League. Teams from Mars and Venus and Neptune and the rest of ’em—and earth of course—and—”

“Hey, wait a minute!” Freddy interrupted. “You’re so far ahead of me you’re out of sight. Let’s just stick to Mars vs. Centerboro, and Mars vs. Tushville, and so on—”

“And Squeak-squeak,” said Mlle Rose.

“I hadn’t forgotten Squeak-squeak,” Freddy said. “I think the first thing—”

Mr. Boomschmidt interrupted him. “Excuse me, Freddy,” he said, jumping up, “I think I’ll have a talk right now with Leo and Herc—see if we can’t organize a team.”

“But look, Mr. Boom,” Freddy said, and then stopped, for Mr. Boomschmidt had bounced right out of the room.

“He’s always like that when he gets a new idea,” said Mlle Rose.

“I know,” Freddy said. “No use trying to talk to him about Squeak-squeak now. Well, I guess—” He stopped suddenly. The tall, red-faced man who had been watching the Martians had turned and looked toward the house, and Freddy recognized him. “That man!” he exclaimed, drawing back from the window. “Now, why’s he up here? He’s a real estate man, E. H. Anderson—Mr. Eha, we used to call him. And I never knew him to be interested in anything he couldn’t make money out of.”

“You know him?” Mlle Rose asked.

“Good heavens, I should say I did! He haunted houses.”

The two women laughed, and Mrs. Boomschmidt said: “He’s a pretty robust ghost. If he tries to seep through a keyhole or under a door he’s going to need a lot of help.”

“Just the same, he was pretty good at it. He had a lot of masks and luminous paint and stuff, and then he had a gang of rats to help him: Simon’s gang. I guess you’ve heard of them.

“It was a racket with Mr. Eha. He’d give out that a house was haunted, and then he’d make it so unpleasant for the folks that lived there that they’d leave. When they tried to sell the house, he’d scare away everybody that came to look at it. Then he’d offer them about a quarter of what it was worth, and by that time they’d be glad to take whatever they could, and they’d sell. He tried that on a hotel up on Otesaraga Lake, and he was going to work it on Mr. Bean’s house. But we broke up his gang.”

“Well, do you think he could have had anything to do with kidnapping Squeak-squeak?” Mlle Rose asked.

“I wouldn’t think so,” said Freddy. “He’s not a kidnapper. But it’s funny, just the same. I’d better find out what he’s up to. I don’t want anybody to know I’m here. I’ll get into a disguise and follow him.”